November 11, 1997

Vietnam increasing repression - report

01:09 a.m. Nov 11, 1997 Eastern

By Adrian Edwards
HANOI, Nov 11 (ReVietnam increasing repression - reportuters) - Vietnam is increasing internal repression and seeking to stifle the press, Human Rights Watch/Asia said on Tuesday said as the communist country readied to host its first international summit.

A highly critical document issued by the organisation's British office said that while Hanoi was trying to promote its open-door and reform policies it was also moving to codify the repression of civil and political rights.

Human Rights Watch/Asia said it was particularly concerned by recent government directives legalising the detention without trial of individuals considered a threat to national security.

Increased controls over both the domestic and foreign press in Vietnam were also a cause for worry, it said.

``While the Vietnamese government pursues this open-door policy and continues to woo foreign investment, domestically it is strengthening Communist Party control, repressing dissent and stifling any development of civil society,'' the statement said.

The report detailed specific concerns over an administrative detention directive approved by Hanoi earlier this year, which it likened to hated measures employed by French colonial administrators during the 1930s to stifle political opposition.

It said the directive was vaguely worded as a catch-all policy intended to legitimise the detention without trial of any individual voicing political dissent for between six months and two years.

Restricted access to information made it impossible to gauge the numbers currently being held, but the report said every province had an administrative detention centre where people were held on charges from threatening national security to prostitution and vagrancy.

``While the Vietnamese government continues to refute that it has any political prisoners it is well documented that numerous dissidents have been arbitrarily arrested and detained, and held either under house arrest, in detention camps or prison,'' it said.

The report went on to detail steps in recent months to increase controls over both the domestic and foreign press.

It noted the arrest last month of a news editor on charges of revealing state secrets through reporting of a politically sensitive corruption case.

It also accused Hanoi of increasing monitoring and harassment of foreign journalists and their Vietnamese staff.

Human Rights Watch/Asia's report, one of the most detailed assessments of Vietnam's rights environment this year, was issued just days ahead of Hanoi's first international summit -- a meeting of more than 30 Francophone nations due to begin on Friday.

The report named 10 leading political and religious dissidents who it said were being detained for views which deviated from the party line, and urged the international community and nations taking part in the summit to press for their release.

``Vietnam's foreign partners should urge the government to increase transparency and accountability within its process of legal reform, and honour international commitments to freedom of speech, freedom of the press and protection from arbitrary detention,'' it said.

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